Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Jazzfest recap!

This past weekend I spent over in Vancouver, BC. I went there for the great food, great company, no cabs at 1:30am, and to perform at the TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival.

The city of Vancouver treated me well. The Jazz Festival was very interesting to be a part of. The Coastal Jazz and Blues Society has been going since 1986, and you could really see how their vision of having many kinds of musicians and cultures intermixed, contributing to the ever evolving world of the art form that is jazz, is alive and well.

I performed on two nights, during the TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival, at the venue/bar/lounge Guilt & Company. This venue is fantastic! Located in Gastown, #1 Alexander Street, underground - below Chill Winston, I fell in love with this place immediately.

-----------------

The concept, somewhat simple and scary at the same time, was this: 3 musicians, who have never performed together, play a 2 hour set, in front of an audience, and hope that everything goes well!

On Friday, June 25th 2010, the first night of the Jazz Festival, I played with Samuel Davidson, on clarinet and EWI (Electronic Wind Instrument) - who can be seen in the band Brasstronauts, as well as Ali Siadat on drums - who can be seen in the band Mother Mother. We played two 45 minute sets, completely improvised as I had never met Sam or Ali in person before our sound check earlier that evening.

I'm in deep 'jazz' concentration here :)

We had a great time, the 2 hours flew by for me. The combination of the drums, clarinet and accordion blended really well. I had never played with someone on the EWI before, but it sounded awesome as well. It was an honour to play with these two musicians, and I hope to play with them again.

These guys, who I once again had not met until that evening at sound check, were fantastic, and once again we blended well. The interaction between the instrumentation of the double bass, electric bass and accordion was a lot of fun!

I would love to play with all 4 of these musicians again soon!

I need to give a big special THANK YOU to Duff McWhirter, who's sound engineering made us all sound great, as well as to Dani Vachon - who contracted me to perform at Guilt & Company for the TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival. It was brilliant to have three musicians, who have never played together on stage before, the opportunity to do so.For more information about the TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival please visit their website at:http://www.coastaljazz.ca/